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Unmechanical

And here is game number two that I’ve been working on!

Press release:

Today, indie developers Talawa Games and Teotl Studios are thrilled to announce the puzzle adventure game Unmechanical, to be released August 8 2012 for PC and a couple of weeks later for iOS.

Unmechanical is an award-winning 2.5D side-scroller which combines tricky puzzle solving, alluring exploration, and an engrossing atmosphere.The game had humble beginnings as a student project and since then both game and team has grown.

“Unmechanical has been about taking on something for real and working our fingers to the bone to get it done. It’s our hopes and ambitions combined into this very personal, unique, and awesome adventure that’s crafted with lots of love.”Said Marko Permanto, project lead for the Unmechanical team.

Unmechanical begins with a twist of fate as you’re spirited away by a network of coiled pipes into a mysterious underworld. You find yourself in a strange environment that pulsates from mechanic and organic machinery alike, and your journey to freedom begins. Flying freely through the odd and fantastic surroundings,a powerful tractor beam lets you pick up objects and interact with the world.

Your quest for freedom requires you to solve a great variety of puzzling challenges, and while it’s easy to pick up and play, later challenges may prove very difficult indeed. On your adventure you might also begin to understand what it all means–The underworld may be more than it seems, the fateful descent more than just chance,and you might not be entirely alone after all…

The game started out as one of the game projects at the education Future Games where I teach. Originally put together in just 4 weeks, the little demo was received so well by everyone that the team decided to carry on with development. And that eventually led to the cooperation between Talawa Games, a new studio started up by part of the original team, and my own company Teotl Studios.
I joined the team about 8 months ago to get the game through its final stages of development. I have been responsible for optimizing all the art and levels, as well visually polishing up all the areas and ensuring the looks and style are consistent throughout the entire game. I also took care of the large majority of the PC to iOS conversion work. Tech/Level artist would sum up my work quite well. My own development work aside, as a company we are helping them with Steam and other business and distribution things.

The iOS version in particular is something that, from a tech perspective, I am particular proud of. We will be revealing iOS shots in the next couple of weeks but I managed to pretty much translate the PC looks to iOS near 1:1, including normal maps and so on at near no performance loss. I’d really like to produce one or two training videos to go over these iOS Unreal Engine tips and tricks I’ve learned later this year, though I am so very out of time all the time so we will see!

Other than this game I’ve also been busy handling the internships at Future Games the past half year. Following up and assisting our students throughout their six month internships, and visiting them at the various places where they went. That got me to visit a wide range of studios over the past few months, ranging from the biggest like Guerrilla Games and Dice to small two man indie teams like Oxeye Studios, the guys behind the indie 2D shooter Cobalt. The contacts aside, one of the big things I got out of the whole experience was probably the industry wide (for within this region at least) perspective and overview on how the industry is moving along.